Elemental Magic
by Agent Malkere
Summary: Kaiba keeps denying his ancient Egyptian past, but when he starts to develop elemental powers denial becomes harder and life in general far more complicated. AU. Humor.
1. Chapter 1: Air

_**Elemental Magic **_

_Agent Malkere _

**Disclaimer: I only borrow the characters; I do not own them. **

_A/N: This story was partially inspired by Jenivi7's story _Phoenix_. I highly recommend reading it._

It had been a long day and had been a bad day and Seto Kaiba had no patience left for any of the members of the geek squad at that moment. For that matter, he didn't have enough patience for _anyone_ let alone them with their stupid Egyptian fairytales and friendship speeches. Mokuba was in the hospital, an inexplicable virus had somehow caused the entire Kaiba Corp mainframe to crash, none of the cars were working properly so now he was having to walk home from work, he had a splitting headache, and it was raining. And now, to top it all off, (as if today hadn't been bad enough to begin with) Seto had accidentally run into Tea Gardener who was now screaming at him for some reason that he couldn't even remember. She hadn't noticed that he hadn't actually said anything yet.

Turning around, thinking of escaping Tea's voice, which was grating on his nerves, Seto started to walk in the opposite direction only to find Gardener once more blocking his way.

"Hey! Where do you think you're going, Kaiba? I'm not done yet!"

"Well I am!" he snarled in response. "Leave me alone!" With that he attempted to continue the shortcut he was taking down the narrow side road.

"Oh no, you don't!" Tea was suddenly blocking his way again. Why? Why did the bottle of Aspirin in his pocket have to be empty?!? He would give anything for about ten of them right now. Seto tried to remain calm and cool – without the Aspirin – despite the circumstances, but what Gardener did next was just too much for Kaiba to bear. She had the audacity to look smug; folding her arms across her chest with an expression that said she knew that she had already won. His extremely limited patience finally gave up the ghost and he snapped. Think: nuclear fallout times ten.

His voice started off as a deadly hiss and then grew to a roar on the last three words,

"I said, _leave. ME._ _**ALONE!!!**_" Suddenly all of the frustration and worry and anger and pain focused into a single point within his body. From somewhere deep inside Seto, somewhere dark and forgotten, a pulse of powerful energy surged through his body and filled him until he felt lightheaded and dizzy. What the heck was going on? Just as suddenly as it had come, the energy rushed out of him along his focused beam of emotions like a laser, leaving him feeling like an empty, hollow shell. He never noticed that his eyes were squeezed tight shut and therefore missed all of what was happening around him.

--

Tea stared open mouthed at Kaiba whose head was bent and fists were clenched. He was suddenly looking a lot more menacing than usual. Maybe she had pushed things a little too far this time. Kaiba _had_ been looking rather more stressed out than normal when Tea had first run into him – now he looked like he was ready to go after blood. More specifically, her blood. Not good…

Out of nowhere a wind had started to pick up and was swirling in almost a mini tornado which seemed to be centering on Kaiba. The young CEO's blue (Duelist Kingdom) trench coat billowed up so the bottom edge almost came up to his shoulders and gravity seemed to lose control on his hair which floated around his head in a sort of chestnut halo. Things didn't really start to get worrying, though, until Tea noticed the blue glow which appeared to be radiating from Kaiba's body. Uh oh… Whatever was going on, it didn't look good. Even as she thought this, a rush of air slammed into her and sent her, literally, flying. Tea was crashed bodily against the wall behind her leaving the dancer stunned and winded.

Tea gaped at Kaiba as she fought to get her breath back. What the heck had just happened?!?

Blue light and wind now gone, Kaiba looked even paler and more drawn than before swaying back and forth unsteadily on his feet, eyes closed. The dancer eyed him untrustingly. Great, was Kaiba possessed or something? This didn't have anything to do with another freak's plans for world domination, did it? She didn't have time to help save the world again – she had an essay due on Monday.

Slowly edging forward, Tea pulled the green raincoat she was wearing a little closer around her, noticing that the black umbrella Kaiba had been carrying had also joined her in smashing into the brick wall along with a now very dented trashcan lid. The handle of the umbrella had snapped clean in two. She glanced back to Kaiba who was still just barely managing to stay on his feet, head hanging, apparently not noticing the rain which was now drenching him. Putting her hands on her hips, Tea glared at him.

"Very funny, Kaiba," she snapped sarcastically. "Now, how the heck did you do that?" Her question received no response, not even an acknowledgement, which succeeded in ticking Tea off even more. "Was it some freakish new type of hologram that you've invented, by any chance?" Still no response. "Hey! I'm talking to you!" Her anger bypassed commonsense and self preservation and propelled Tea over to the silent CEO's side. She shoved him in the arm rather hard.

Instead of retaliating in any form, Kaiba simply collapsed. Tea stared slack jawed at the lip form on the ground in front of her, completely taken aback. Okay, Kaiba was officially the first person she had even met who could remain standing while unconscious. That was just weird.

Tea pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and speed dialed Yugi's number.

"Uh, hi Yugi! You're not going to believe what's just happened…"

--

Seto didn't want to wake up; he had a feeling that he'd really regret it and, besides, he was exhausted. It felt like he'd been awake for two days straight – something which he'd unfortunately had experience with before. His headache was what finally forced him fully back to consciousness, if not coherent-ness. Groaning at the pounding in his head, Seto slowly reached up one hand and gently massaged his temples without opening his eyes. Somewhere over him he could hear voices but he still couldn't make out what they were saying yet.

Darn he was cold! It felt like he had been dunked in a tub of ice water! Seto could feel his sodden clothes clinging heavily to his body. Where was he? He certainly wasn't in his bed back at the mansion – at least there he would have been warm and dry. The only time he had ever woken up in a cold, _wet_ bed was last year on April 1st due to one of Mokuba's distinctly overly enthusiastic April Fools pranks. Not to mention that his mattress was a whole lot softer than whatever it was he was lying on – it felt like concrete. Might as well have a look around.

Slowly opening his eyes, Seto squinted at his surroundings, namely, several pairs of extremely familiar looking shoes that were standing in a semicircle around him. Oh, damn…. Lifting his gaze, the young CEO was rewarded with the sight of the geek squad staring down at him with variations of concern and confusion. Only something about the group wasn't quite right….

"Where the heck am I and why the _hell_ are there two of you?!?" he snapped, his latter question directed at Yugi. Seto was given a look of complete and utter shock by both versions of his rival before the two Yugis exchanged a bewildered glance with each other. The translucent Yugi was a few inches taller than the solid Yugi with a few more spikes of gold in his hair and a more angular shape to his eyes which made him appear older and more jaded than his counterpart. The solid Yugi was shorter with a rounder face and larger rounder eyes which emanated a level of innocence and naivety which no high school student should be capable of.

Seto forced himself to sit up even though every muscle in his body seemed to scream in protest. Actually, it was more like his muscles were screaming 'Don't get up! Go back to sleep!' but he ignored them anyway. He folded his arms unsteadily across his chest and glared at the geek squad, waiting for an answer.

Short Yugi bit his lip and glanced over at his doubled image again. Tall, transparent Yugi nodded and suddenly there was a flash of golden light from the eye of the puzzle around solid Yugi's neck. When Seto could see properly again without seeing any multicolored spots, the two Yugis had switched places – the taller one now solid and the shorter transparent. He clutched his temples with one hand; it felt like firecrackers had started going off inside of his head.

"Don't _do _that! You're making my headache worse!"

Now the entire group was staring at the young CEO in bewilderment.

"Stop what?" asked the solid Yugi, his voice sounding distinctly deeper than before.

"You could _see_ that?!?" interrupted Tea in shock before the taller Yugi could continue.

"Who are you and what have you done with Kaiba, the jerk we all know and hate?" Joey eyed him suspiciously. Seto rolled his eyes and immediately regretted it as it caused the world to do a slow, stomach-turning flip in front of his eyes.

"Get a brain, mutt," he snarled. All of this was still getting him no closer to an explanation of what the hell was going on. He thought about standing up so that he could tower over them and intimidate an answer out of the dorks, but thought better of it. Seto had a strong feeling that standing up wouldn't be the wisest move at the movement. Falling flat on your face was never particularly impressive, no matter where you were.

Tristan took a few hesitant steps forward and poked Seto in the shoulder.

"Alright, who's really in there? Yami Marik or the evil spirit of the ring?"

"Get. Your. Hands. Off. Me."

Tristan hastily jumped back and retreated behind Joey.

"Okay! Only evil Kaiba!" He shot a nervous glance at Joey, who had stepped to one side so that he wasn't standing between Tristan and Seto any more. His friend shrugged.

"Who'd ya expect? It's always evil Kaiba in there."

Seto, who had been glowering icily at Tristan, turned his attention momentarily back to Joey.

"Shut up and quit yapping, mutt, or I'll call the pound. Dogs aren't supposed to be wandering around the city without a leash on." Seto smirk as he watched Tristan surreptitiously clamp one hand over the blonde's mouth in order to prevent another one of the mildly famous (at Domino High anyway) Kaiba-Wheeler fights. He returned his glare to the two Yugis this time. "None of you have answered my question yet."

'Yami, do you think he means that he can see both of us at once?' asked the shorter, translucent Yugi.

"And I can hear you, too. What a surprise," the CEO snapped irritably. He was sick of this. With a snarl of frustration, Seto dragged himself to his feet and nearly fell down again in the process. Why was he so tired? Why was he even bothering with trying to question the geek squad? They were always useless, using magic as an explanation for darn near anything out of the ordinary, though, Seto was forced to admit to himself that he couldn't come up with a logical explanation for two Yugis standing around – especially one you could see through… and was now floating about a foot off the ground…. Seto's face went slightly paler at this sight. His eyes were playing tricks on him that was all. …Really _convincing _tricks. And so were his ears.

"Hear who?" Tea asked, frowning. "None of us said anything."

"Oh, please, Gardener, I'm not deaf and blind. Do you really think I'd fall for that?"

"Then what did you hear?" ask the taller Yugi before Tea could make the scathing retort that she obviously wanted to.

"What do you think? Him," here Seto pointed to transparent Yugi, "asking you if I meant that I could see both of you at once – which by the way, I can. Now, are you or aren't you going to tell me what's going on?!? If not, you can stop wasting my time."

"First o' all, moneybags, there ain't even anybody _standing_ where you're pointing," stated Joey. "And second," here he leaned forward and squinted at the CEO, "why are the ends of your hair turning green?"

Seto froze for the briefest moment in panic before collecting himself once more. "None of your damn business, mutt," he snapped and then, deciding that an explanation wasn't worth this much trouble, he left at a fast pace, trench coat fluttering slightly behind him, mutter a string of foul curses which occasionally involved the words 'green' and 'hair.' He was going to go home and change and then visit Mokuba again in the hospital and forget all about this unsettling encounter.

--

Yami, Yugi, Joey, Tea, and Tristan watched Kaiba go in a rather non-plus-ed silence which lasted for several minutes after the CEO of Kaiba Corp was out of sight. It was Tea who finally said something.

"You're right, Joey. The bottom three inches of his hair _were_ green. Weird."

"So, have ya got any idea what moneybags was talking about, Yami?"

The ancient pharaoh nodded his head with a small rueful smile,

"Kaiba could hear Yugi and I talking through our mind link."

"Huh? How?"

"I'm not completely sure but if what I can remember of my past is correct, I think I have a fairly good idea."

_A/N: What do y'all think? Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed it!_


	2. Chapter 2: Water

_A/N: Chapter 2 is finally here! Oh, and for those who were wondering what Mokuba has – he has an extremely bad case of giardia (sp?) which is the same thing that hospitalized me this summer._

Seto stood and stared up at the rather imposing front of the hospital for a moment before letting out a quiet sigh and entering the lobby through the rotating doors. If he didn't know for a fact that several of his employees were working together to try to make an aggressive takeover attempt within the very near future he would simply be staying with Mokuba in his hospital room. Shoving his hands into the pockets of the dry trench coat he had changed into after his little run in with the geek squad, Seto trudged passed the receptionist's desk not bothering to sign in. This was the fifth day in a row that he'd come here and the hospital staff already knew who he was – it was pretty much impossible not to unless you had never watched the news, glanced at a newspaper, or taken any sort of interest in Duel Monsters.

Ignoring the whispers and surreptitiously pointing fingers of patients and staff members alike, the young CEO opted to take the stairs to the second floor instead of risking being stuck in an elevator with some random person. Elevators always seemed to make people chummier than normal as well as a lot nosier. The second floor was the pediatric ward which housed all those eighteen years or younger who were hospitalized. It was the only floor of the building that didn't completely set Seto's teeth on edge and that was because of the walls. At some point in time the hospital had hired a professional artist to come in and paint the children's level and what had resulted was dragons of all shapes and sizes. They perched above doorways and soared gracefully down the halls majestic and powerful yet gentle and protective at the same time. The dragons made the pediatric ward feel… safe, like no harm could befall anyone who stayed there – the dragons were always watching, prepared to protect their young charges at a moment's notice.

His shoes tapped quietly on the linoleum as he walked with long strides towards Mokuba's room which was at the far end of the long hall. Several nurses were making their rounds and a few young patients were walking from one end of the hall to the other, IV stands and parents in tow. One such patient stopped, turning his concentration from his slow, careful steps to stare wide eyed at the tall brunette as he strode by and tugged on the sleeve of his mother who had dark circles under her eyes from lack of sleep and stress. The boy's previously dull eyes seemed to sparkle for a moment as he pointed at the retreating back of the CEO.

"Look, mommy! It's the man from the _Matrix_! I told you he came here!"

The corners of Seto's mouth twitched in the slightest hint of a smile. That was what Mokuba always said he looked like whenever he wore this outfit – all black, including his long sleeved trench coat, the only thing missing were his reflective, wrap-around sunglasses. He'd been in rather a hurry to leave once he'd got back to the mansion and changed after his run in with the freak patrol and hadn't felt like trying to find anything other than the first coat he grabbed which just so happened to be black.

Mokuba was in room 2062b and as Seto quietly opened the door the softly breathing lump with black hair curled up in the bed told him that his little brother was sleeping. An IV was attached to the preteen's arm on the inside of his left elbow and the stuffed blue dragon Seto had gotten him was nestled by his chest, the fingers of the boy's left hand loosely encircling its neck. Seto stood at the foot of the bed, content for now to watch the peaceful rise and fall of his brother's chest as he slept. The stuffed dragon – ah, yes, that was an adventure Seto hoped never to repeat again. He'd had to go into a toy store… by himself… and, well, in all honesty he'd found the whole experience rather humiliating. At least he hadn't been wearing one of his famous trench coats at the time, especially the white one (his personal favorite) which he'd worn for Battle City. It had a tendency to knock things off of shelves when he wasn't looking. And the cashier had kept giving him the strangest looks. But it had all been worth it for the look on Mokuba's face when he'd given him the present.

A faint tired noise and the rustling of sheets shook Seto from his thoughts. Gray eyes peered at him disoriented-ly from under a rat's nest of black hair.

"Hey, Mokuba."

The preteen's eyes lit up at the sight of his older brother and he stifled a yawn with one hand.

"Hey, Seto!" Mokuba gave his big brother a tired grin and pushed a button on the guard rail of his hospital bed causing the head of his bed to rise and making it easier for him to sit up. He settled the stuffed dragon in his lap as he watched Seto slowly lower himself into the chair next to Mokuba with a tired sigh. "Bad day, big brother?"

"Yeah, I guess you could say that," the CEO mumbled running his fingers through his bangs.

"Is that why you forgot to dye your hair?" asked Mokuba curiously. Seto was rather, okay _extremely_, obsessive when it came to what color his hair was. Hand still in his hair, Seto froze eyes wide.

"What?!" He'd just re-dyed his hair back to a uniform chestnut brown before he'd come to visit Mokuba. It couldn't have _possibly_ come out again that quickly!

"It's got green flames on the bottom again," the younger boy stated, trying to hide his grin. He couldn't wait to see his brother's reaction to this! It would definitely break up the monotony of his day thus far.

Seto pulled a lock down in front of his eyes and cursed explicitly (and rather loudly) when he saw that the ends of his hair were once more a stubborn dark emerald green.

"Wow – that's a new one, Seto! I didn't even know you could use those words in the same sentence – I'll have to make a note of it!"

Seto was about to snap back a suitably sarcastic comment to this when a voice from the doorway interrupted him.

"What's this I hear about f-ing emerald green hair?"

His head snapped up and Seto whirled in his chair to see Yugi and co silhouetted in the doorframe. Mokuba grinned happily and bounced up and down slightly in his hospital bed, very pleased by this turn of events.

"Hi guys! Seto was just complaining that his hair dye has stopped working again!"

"Mokuba!" Seto yelped. He really hadn't wanted anyone else to know about this – especially the geek squad – now he'd never hear the end of it.

"Hair dye?" asked Yugi (there was only one of him at the moment – the naïve version) puzzled.

"Yeah, big brother has been dying his hair ever since we got adopted 'cause he didn't think that people would take him seriously if his hair had green flames in it!"

"Woah, hold on jus' a sec! Ya mean that Kaiba's hair is _naturally_ that color?!?" asked Joey, pointing at Seto who was now slouched miserably in his chair next to his little brother. Had Seto mentioned that he was having a lousy day?

"Yup!" Mokuba confirmed cheerfully. The CEO sank lower in his chair. "Honestly, I don't see what his problem with it is – I think it's really cool!"

Joey seemed to think about this for a minute then grinned widely, pumping one fist into the air.

"Yes! Finally I've got blackmail material, moneybags!" he crowd gleefully.

"Weren't you paying attention, mutt? My hair has become dye _resistant_. That means I _can't _dye it any more and will therefore have to go like this to work tomorrow. I'm sure every paparazzi crew and tabloid will have a picture of me like this within an hour of my arrival, so by the time you try to blackmail me it will be old news." Seto glared at Joey pointedly and the blonde scowled, making the CEO feel the slightest bit better. Provoking the mutt was a pastime he always found at least somewhat enjoyable.

"How are you feeling, Mokuba?" asked Yugi quickly to prevent the oncoming fight.

"Better – the doctors are going to let me start eating solid food again," announced Mokuba proudly. He'd been on a clear liquids diet for two days and then soft food for another two days ("I can eat anything that goes 'splat' when you throw it against the wall," he had grumbled to Seto) and was thoroughly sick of all things mushy. "But what are you guys doing here, other than to visit me, I mean? Or are you going to start visiting me every couple of hours until they release me – not that we're complaining or anything."

Tea and Yugi exchanged glances and Tristan positioned himself by the door ready to bolt if a hasty exit should be called for. Seto felt the beginnings of his headache coming back as, with a flash of bright golden light two Yugis were once more in the room – the taller one solid this time. The teenage CEO let out the quietest of moans and massaged his temples. Why did they have to keep _doing_ that?!?

"Well, Mokuba," solid Yugi began explaining, eyeing Seto cautiously trying to gauge what his reaction would be, "I don't think your brother will appreciate hearing this but… after an… _incident_ earlier today we believe, as strange as this might sound, that he might be developing… elemental powers."

That statement peaked Seto's irritation. He felt air currents ruffling his hair as his frustration with this whole situation mounted – damn draughts. Of course they'd think it was magic. They _always_ thought it was magic! That was how the geek squad explained _everything_ and he'd had it up to _here_ with all of their hocus pocus nonsense!

"Can't you get it through your thick heads?" he snarled, standing up. "Magic does not exist! And I do not. Have. Elemental. POWERS!"

As he almost shouted this last statement, Seto turned and received one of the greatest shocks of his life. All the water that had been in the nearly full glass next to Mokuba's bed was now hovering about two feet above the glass turning gently, a faint blue aura shining around it. Something compelled him to glance down at his clenched fists. His hands and forearms were glowing the same shade of blue only more brightly and his hair was whipping around his head more wildly than before. He froze, eyes widening, his face becoming deathly pale as he continued to stare at his glowing hands. _Holy __**shit**_

"Then just how do you explain that?" solid Yugi asked raising an eyebrow and looking pointedly at the floating water.

That was a very good question indeed.


	3. Chapter 3: Run

_A/N: …oh my god… it's an… update…. *faints*_

Seto knew that shoving past Yugi and sprinting out of the hospital room hadn't been the best response he could have come up with, but he didn't particularly care. This was all too much. This was all just too much.

He ignored the stares and questioning looks of patients and nursing staff alike as he ran for safety. Why he would be safer outside the hospital than in it wasn't exactly clear in his mind, but he wanted out and he wanted out _now_. Kaiba let out a faint sigh of relief when he finally stumbled out through the rotating front doors and glanced over his shoulder to find that nobody was following him. The young CEO forced himself to slow his pace to a walk. It had stopped raining about an hour ago thankfully. His feet lead him numbly down the sidewalk, not really paying attention to where he was going.

Kaiba stared at his hands, at the familiar long, pale fingers, remembering the blue glow that had surrounded them. He wanted to write off what had happened as an optical illusion, a trick of the light, his imagination, _anything_. But he couldn't. He didn't know why, but he just couldn't. Something about the entire experience had felt so… _familiar_ and yet alien at the same time. There was no scientific explanation that Kaiba could think of for what had just happened, unless the laws of physics, gravity, and several other very important things had gone temporarily haywire in an extremely localized manner. And that sort of thing just didn't happen. Then again, until today, floating blobs of glowing water and two not quite identical Yugis who kept switching places just didn't happen either… and now they did. Repeatedly. And there had also been another reliable witness there this last time, too. (By reliable witness, he was, of course, referring to Mokuba. The geek squad was not reliable – most of the time they were insane and annoying.)

Had he… really done that? With the water? Seto cringed at how silly and stupid the idea sounded even within the confines of his own head. But still, what other explanation _was_ there? Kaiba stopped walking for a moment and closed his eyes, remembering the sensations that had run through his body at the exact second before he'd turned around and seen the water hovering above Mokuba's side table. It had been like his entire body was tingling. No, tingling wasn't the right word. That made it sound like the sensation had been unpleasant. It was like… It was like… his body, his entire being, his very soul had been humming a single, unified note that made the very air around him vibrate. For a moment, that single blink in time, he'd been whole, one with everything around him. And he'd reached out with his emotions until they brushed against something cool which had… reacted….

Slowly, Seto opened his eyes and then stared in bewilderment as he realized his hands were glowing blue again. Thin threads of water (which were also glowing blue) stretched up from the puddle at his feet and were weaving between his fingers like delicate glass snakes. He raised his hands up so that they were level with his face, and the tendrils of well trained water lengthened and followed the path of his moving fingers. That… wasn't natural.

He glanced around quickly to see if anybody was watching (they weren't – he was alone) and then shook his hands in an attempted to dislodge the tentacles trailing around them. The water, it turned out, could not be so easily dissuaded. It was persistent.

Damn it all, this was illogical! Water wasn't supposed to _do_ this! But that had already been firmly established. In a burst of frustration, Kaiba shook his hands even harder still, despite the redundancy of this action. It, once again, failed to work. He just barely resisted the urge to scream.

"Will you just let _GO_ already?" he shouted, not caring how ridiculous yelling at an inanimate object was. The part of his brain that always kept him calm, cool, and collected, his temper in check, and all of his actions under impeccable control had jumped ship as soon as it first caught sight of that damnable blue glow. His normally organized, efficient mind was in utter chaos and anarchy. If the paparazzi had been there, they would have had a field day. The great Seto Kaiba was having an emotional breakdown – one that had been years in the making.

Seto tilted his head back and screamed at the sky like a mad man and he didn't care. For once just _didn't care_ that he was breaking. Wouldn't have cared even if the whole world had been watching him at that moment.

"WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH ME?"

The water dropped and splattered across the floor the instant Kaiba sprinted out of the hospital room.

"Wait!" Mokuba's voice halted the group just as they were about to turn and give chase. "Seto needs some time to think. If you run after him and try to force him to realize what's going on, he'll just push back even harder and reject the idea. That's why you've never gotten through to him before – big brother hates it when other people try to force ideas on him. He needs to come to his own conclusions first."

"Wait a minute," Joey interrupted, "ya mean if we hadn't tried so hard to get Kaiba to believe all the stuff about the millennium items and been so in his face about it, moneybags would have come around in his own time?" the blond asked incredulously. Mokuba gave a small shrug.

"Maybe, I don't know, but I do know the way you've been going about it up until now was basically doomed to fail from the start. Seto will happily deny the evidence of his own eyes if people push him too hard about it. Like with Duelist Kingdom. Right afterwards he was really starting to think that there was more to dueling than just winning and that maybe having a purpose mattered. But then Ishizu showed up, pushed WAY too hard on the whole ancient Egypt thing, you guys started pushing on the heart of the cards and all that again, and everything majorly backfired and turned into Seto in the Battle City Tournament. Before that he was practically on the verge of considering you guys his friends." Mokuba leaned further back into the pillows on his bed with a sigh and hugged the blue, stuffed dragon he was holding even closer. "Just give him some time. He'll come around eventually."

"I didn't think we'd ever pushed him _that_ hard," muttered Tristan, who was still leaning against the doorframe but no longer looking like he was about to bolt.

Mokuba rolled his eyes and snorted.

"If you think big brother rants a lot, you should try listening to yourselves sometime. Compared to you guys, Seto doesn't talk at all."

Silence descended on the room for several moments as Yugi, Yami, Joey, Tea, and Tristan thought about this latest revelation of how the mind of Kaiba worked.

"I guess we never really did try to change tactics," Yami finally admitted sheepishly. Floating in the air next to him, Yugi nodded, though only Yami could see him.

'_I told you lecturing wasn't the way to go,'_ Yugi teased, poking the ex-pharaoh in the side with a transparent finger.

"Was he really starting to think of us as friends?" asked Tea, pausing in her effort to wipe up the spilt water on the floor with paper towels. Mokuba nodded. "Then why was he always such a jerk to us?"

"You guys aren't particularly accepting of people who don't think like you do, and Seto _doesn't_ think like you do. Not many people think quite the way he does. That and, though he may technically be a genius, big brother is seriously lacking when it comes to social skills, especially with other people his age." Mokuba yawned widely and lowered the head of his bed a bit. He rolled onto his side so he was still facing them, but he was obviously starting to wear out fast. It seemed that the eternal wisdom of Mokuba was coming to a close for today. How could a kid that young understand so much about life?

Joey glanced idly at his watch and then did a double take.

"Ah, _shoot_! Sorry, guys, I gotta get going. See ya, Mokuba!"

Mokuba waved and yawned again as Joey hurried out of the hospital room.

Seto slouched to the ground. He was exhausted, quite possibly lost, didn't have his mobile (he'd forgotten to take it out of the pocket of his other trench coat), and glowing blue strands of water were still having a love-fest around his hands. Somewhere along the line, he'd managed to acquire several _more_ tendrils of water instead of losing any. He'd spent nearly a quarter hour screaming (mainly profanity) at the sky. The sky hadn't even so much as blinked. Exactly _why _the sky _should_ have blinked, Seto didn't know, but he thought it should have at _least_ bally well reacted. He glowered up at the low hanging, gray clouds. He didn't care how irrational it was – right here and now, Seto wanted to make sure that the sky was clear on the fact that this entire fiasco was _its fault_, not his. After all, it had been the one who had _rained_ in the first place. Damn rain. If it hadn't rained, maybe he wouldn't have run into Gardener. What had happened to his umbrella anyways? Probably back in that side road somewhere. He'd _liked_ that umbrella, too. He added that to his mental list of why this was all the sky's fault. If it hadn't been raining, he wouldn't have needed an umbrella and wouldn't have taken one with him and, therefore, would have been unable to lose said umbrella.

He resisted the urge to lie down right there on the sidewalk and go to sleep. No way was he waking up on the cold, hard pavement twice in one day. Seto blinked twice as several more tears slid down his face. When the hell had he started crying? Not that it really mattered anymore. He just didn't care.

A long sigh escaped his lips as tears continued to drip off his chin. Seto tilted his head back to stare at the sky again. It didn't look like it was feeling particularly guilty over what it had done. That, or it had a _very_ good poker face, the heartless bastard. People called him that sometimes – heartless bastard. Especially the mutt. Idiot. If he really _was_ a heartless bastard, then he wouldn't be crying like this, Mokuba would have been abandoned back in the orphanage, Gardener would be dead, Yugi would be dead, Alistair would be dead, and Kaiba Corp would still be producing weapons of mass destruction. Oh, and Pegasus would have been mailed to several different countries via parcel post – at once. The _real_ heartless bastard had committed suicide when Seto took over his company.

Yeah, so he wasn't a heartless bastard, he just acted like one. Sometimes, life was so much easier if people assumed you didn't have a conscience. Nobody seemed to worry about calling him nasty things directly to his face. They seemed to think that he took them as a complement – job well done, everybody still thinks you're an asshole. He hated them. Hated their smug smiles and confident attitudes and years upon years of job experience. They sneered at him so he sneered back. Only Kaiba went to meetings, Seto always stayed home. Only heartless bastards with lots of money were allowed to go to those meetings.

Seto lay back on the sidewalk spread eagle and continued to stare up at the sky. Sitting up took too much effort. He just wouldn't fall asleep like this.

Joey hurried down the street towards his apartment building. Serenity would be showing up in just under two hours and there was still nothing to eat in his apartment and nowhere for her to sleep. He'd meant to go shopping earlier, but gotten distracted by the whole Kaiba thing. If he hurried, he just might be able to pull things together before she showed up.

He came to a stop across the street from his building. Ah, damn it. Some crazy guy was sleeping on the sidewalk in front of his apartment again.


End file.
